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A US pipeline for jihad in Somalia?
| Seattle
Nearly two decades after their parents fled war and famine for the safety and abundance of Minnesota, Ohio, and the wet suburbs of Seattle, a steady stream of young Somali-American men are headed back into the fight.
They are going to wage jihad in a homeland they barely know, driven by a heady brew of nationalist and religious fervor and lured by what experts say is a sophisticated recruitment network exploiting vulnerabilities in the Somali diaspora.
As many as six Somali-Americans are believed to have died after taking up arms with Al Shabab, the Al Qaeda-linked Islamist militants battling the transitional government in Somalia. Shirwa Ahmed, who traveled from Minneapolis to help execute an attack on Oct. 29, 2008, that killed 20 people, is believed to be the first American suicide bomber.
Somali refugees in North America and Europe began returning to their homeland to fight after Ethiopia invaded Somalia in 2006, routing the Islamist coalition then governing much of the country. The incursion provoked a declaration of holy war by Somalia's Muslim hard-liners against their neighboring Christian nation, and, more broadly, the United States for its perceived support of the invasion.
Since then at least 20 young Somali-Americans have gone to join the insurgency. Their path to radicalization, and perhaps eventually to the ranks of militant Islam, represents a pressing concern for US counterterrorism officials today. Many of the young men who traveled to the battlefields in the Horn of Africa have died, but a handful have returned.
There's no evidence yet that these Al Shabab (the Youth) fighters have targets outside their homeland, federal officials say, but radicalized US citizens or legal residents present a unique challenge – they can come and go with relative ease.
"That is the single most significant issue," says David Gomez, assistant special agent-in-charge of the Seattle field office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Once someone has been radicalized and trained by militants, he says, "he is then a viable recruitment target for any terrorist group."
A string of recent counterterrorism cases adds new weight to this concern. In December, five young Americans from the Washington, D.C., area were arrested in Pakistan for reportedly trying to join a militant training camp connected to Al Qaeda. In Chicago, David Headley has been charged with traveling to India to help orchestrate the 2008 Mumbai (Bombay) attacks that killed about 170 people.
And a federal terrorism case against a Denver airport shuttle driver, arrested in September, claims that he intended to use bombmaking know-how obtained in Pakistan to blow up New York subways.
"The question remains: How do we protect ourselves from threats that emanate from overseas? We cannot close our borders or cut off the Internet. We must start at the source," FBI Director Robert Mueller said earlier this year in a talk to the Council on Foreign Relations.
Radicalization in the US is a complex riddle for law enforcement because it occurs in myriad ways – behind closed doors, via the Internet, through friends, in prisons, even at mosques. Many experts say the Somali diaspora presents a particularly fertile ground for terrorist recruitment.
"Among Somali-Americans, the refugee experience of fleeing a war-torn country, combined with perceived discrimination, marginalization, and frustrated expectations, as well as local criminal, familial, and clan dynamics may heighten the susceptibility of some members of these communities to criminal or extremist influences," said Andrew Liepman, deputy director of intelligence for the National Counterterrorism Center, at a March Senate hearing on Al Shabab recruitment in the US.
A community struggling to assimilate
In the Seattle area, the Somali community is clustered in Tukwila, a bedroom community next door to the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, where many work as vendors and baggage handlers. Many others drive cabs and trucks.
The Somali community here and elsewhere in the US – estimated at 70,000 to 200,000 – is largely poor and working-class, and struggling to integrate into American society. They are suspicious of the police and distrustful of the government – fears that were heightened when Somali brokers who handle remittances and groceries came under federal scrutiny following 9/11.
In Somali grocery stores and cafes in Tukwila, talk over cups of cardamom tea often centers on the politics of their homeland. The community's deep Muslim faith is evident in the decorated prayer rugs in the back of restaurants that serve traditional goat and spaghetti and the mosque donation boxes at markets. It's a closed community still getting comfortable with America.
"They live here, but they don't live here physically. You won't see them at Seahawks games," says Abdirahman Warsame, who came to the US in 1996 and now works as a building security manager just outside Seattle.
Two years ago, Mr. Warsame began blogging about the increased terrorist attacks in Somalia. Recently he republished an article reporting that a Somali man from the Seattle area died in a Sept. 17 suicide attack on African Union peacekeepers that killed 21 people. The FBI would not confirm the perpetrator's identity but did not dispute local reports that a Seattle resident may have been the latest American to die for Al Shabab's cause.
Al Shabab emerged from the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), a coalition of hard-line and moderate Muslim leaders that wrested control of much of Somalia from brutal warlords in 2006. Shortly afterward, longtime enemy Ethiopia invaded. The ICU fled Mogadishu without a fight, but the violent insurgency that followed was taken over by the ICU's military wing – the newly powerful Al Shabab. The insurgency continues today against the Ethiopian-backed transitional government.
Al Shabab's leaders soon sought an alliance with Al Qaeda, linking its fight to Osama bin Laden's war against the West. The US designated it a terrorist group in February 2008.
Al Qaeda, in turn, voiced support for the group as early as 2007, and many non-Somali fighters are reported to be training with Al Shabab to help establish Islamic rule in Somalia. The participation of Somali-Americans and other foreigners gives Al Shabab the cachet of fighting a global jihad. Al Shabab's chief propagandist is a Muslim convert from Alabama named Omar Hammami. But while its rhetoric is akin to Al Qaeda's, Al Shabab's goals lie chiefly in Somalia.
Sophisticated network of recruiters in US
Warsame says Al Shabab's cause has the sympathy of many Somali religious leaders in the US who, he says, have been complicitous in recruitment efforts. But others refute that notion.
"The mosque is a good place," says a middle-aged server at a Tukwila cafe. "This is not happening at the mosque. These are crazy, crazy people," he says of the suicide bombers in Somalia.
However, there is some evidence that Al Shabab is recruiting in mosques in Somali communities. According to court documents in the terrorism case against 14 Somali men in Minneapolis, some of the accused made phone calls to Somalia from a Minneapolis mosque "to discuss the need for Minnesota-based coconspirators to go to Somalia to fight the Ethiopians."
Little is known about how Al Shabab recruits fighters. But experts say there's a high level of organization in its efforts – from identifying recruits to transportation to fundraising.
"Not only do you have recruiters, but you have a recruiting network that is sophisticated," says Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, vice president of research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and author of "My Year Inside Radical Islam." "In most [radicalization] cases, I can't say that there is a formal recruitment network.... There seems to be more of a formal structure in place to get young people out to Somalia."
Interrupting the network will require vast improvement in the strained relations between law enforcement and the Somali community. At the March Senate hearing, Osman Ahmed, the uncle of a Minneapolis teenager killed in Somalia, called for the government to help Somalis "escape enemy hands," suggesting that the young men going to fight in Somalia are more victims than agents of terror.
"We need our US government to forgive these youth to enable us to find ways and means to bring them back to their homes. And this will give confidence to many more families to come out of darkness," he said.
But the raft of charges the Somali men from Minneapolis are facing – conspiracy to kill, providing material support to terrorist organizations, attending terrorist training camps, to name a few – suggests that federal counterterrorism officials want to send a clear message that crimes committed in Somalia are likely to lead to criminal convictions in America.
See also:
Al Shabab blamed for Somalia bombing. Is Al Qaeda's influence rising?
Follow us on Twitter: @CSMNational

subset: commoncrawl


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Ryan Murphy Teases a 'Scream Queens' Revival
The Chanels might be coming back!
If you were as heartbroken as we were when Scream Queens was canceled after only two seasons, then we've got some amazing news for you: The show's creator, Ryan Murphy, announced on Instagram that a few of the main characters want to revive the series—and so far Emma Roberts, Lea Michele, Billie Lourd are all on board.
He explained that if the show is rebooted, they're thinking about bringing it back as a six-part limited series or as a film. "So many people recently have been asking me about rebooting or continuing SCREAM QUEENS (RIP, taken too soon). Emma, Billie, Lea and I have mused on it, but question: should it be a six episode limited? A catch up movie? Who should I bring back? Would love your thoughts. So many questions...." he teased.
There's no word on whether Keke Palmer, Abigail Breslin, or Jamie Lee Curtis are interested, but if we had it our way, we'd have everyone from season one come back, including Ariana Grande, Nick Jonas, and Glen Powell.
Fans, including Queen B Chanel Oberlin herself, seem to agree that the "thank u, next" singer's character should definitely be brought back from the dead.
We need this to happen.


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User:Ruhemaus/Maus's Law
This page is a personal article, and may not conform to WikiFur's standards for tone or neutral writing. As a courtesy, please contact the author, Ruhemaus, if you wish to make major changes.
Created by Ruhemaus in 2003, he noticed that while Godwin's Law covered most the Internet, it didn't really come into play to stop most flame wars in the furry community. Thus he crated Maus's Law. Since it's creation, it's been proven true time and time again to be accurate. The law itself is as follows:
- As a discussion in a furry newsgroup or community (be it on the MUCKs, IRC, LiveJournal, Blogs, or any Internet forum.) grows longer, the probability of someone involved in the discussion being implicated in art theft in some form approaches one.
Once this occurs, whomever mentioned one of the triggers has 'lost' whatever argument was in progress. This does not mean that the thread will end by any means; it just means that any further posts to this thread are going to be pointless to read. Also, it should be noted that if you try to invoke Maus's Law just to end a thread, it will likely backfire and the fighting will become much more severe.
On a side note, As with Godwin's Law itself, the mention of Sibe and others like him are akin to name-dropping Hitler in a normal 'discussion'. To call the big names accused of art theft into the mix, and to insinuate someone was like them or may be them is referring to art theft itself, thus still enacting the law.


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Teenager involved in Dewsbury street robbery
The incident happened on Friday May 23 as he walked on Moorcroft, at around 7.20am when the male suspect stopped the victim and asked him for the time.
Detective Constable Peter Usher, from Kirklees CID, said: "As the victim took his mobile phone out of his pocket the suspect attempted to grab the phone and a struggle ensued.
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide Ad"Shortly after the victim had shouted for help the suspect fled the scene empty handed.
"He is described as a white male in his late teens, around 5ft 6" tall with a thin build and a defined narrow beard and goatee and had 'wide eyes'. He was wearing a pair of light grey Adidas tracksuit bottoms with three black stripes down the legs and a matching grey Adidas jumper. He was also wearing a black beanie style hat.
"Fortunately the victim was not injured in the attempted robbery but was left shaken by the incident."
Anyone with information is asked to contact Detective Constable Peter Usher in Kirklees CID in 101 or by calling Crimestoppers, anonymously and in confidence, on 0800 555 111.


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329.Legally Adopted Children
329.1What is the definition of legally adopted child?
A "legally adopted child" of the worker means a child who was legally adopted under the adoption laws of the State or foreign country where the adoption took place.
A child who is legally adopted by the worker's surviving spouse after the worker's death is considered the worker's legally adopted child as of the date of the worker's death if:
The child was either living with or receiving one-half support from the worker at the time of the worker's death; and
One of the following is met:
The worker started proceedings to adopt the child before his or her death; or
The child was adopted by the worker's surviving spouse within two years after the worker's death.
329.2What is the effective date of an adoption decree?
The effective date of an adoption decree is important in deciding when an adopted child becomes entitled to benefits. In some States, both an interlocutory and final decree of adoption may be issued. In other States, only one decree or order is issued. The effective date of an adoption is determined by the law of the State where the adoption took place.
Last Revised: Jun. 29, 2004


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Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
LAS VEGAS (AP) - Health officials said Saturday they're investigating whether a contagious stomach virus is the cause of an outbreak that has sickened dozens of players, coaches and parents taking part in a youth football tournament in Las Vegas.
Southern Nevada Health District spokesman Jorge Viote said his agency is interviewing the sick and taking samples from them as part of an investigation to pinpoint the cause of the outbreak.
But he said the flu-like symptoms of vomiting and diarrhea are consistent with norovirus, a mostly food- or water-borne illness that can also be spread by an infected person.
"That's why we're advising people to wash hands and take other precautions," Viote told The Associated Press. "It can spread if people don't take precautions."
An unknown number of players and adults were taken to the hospital for treatment, he added.
Health officials were unsure how many people have fallen ill. But KSNV-TV in Las Vegas reported about 100 people have developed flu-like symptoms, including about 50 players and adults from a team in Santa Monica, Calif., and about 25 from a team in Bakersfield, Calif.
Kristiene Bulley, spokeswoman for the Bakersfield team, said players and adults began getting sick early Friday after eating Thanksgiving dinner the night before.
"We had to forfeit after the first quarter today because players were off on the side with cramps and vomit," she said Saturday. "We are headed home now to Bakersfield."
Tournament spokesman Justin Gates said at least nine of some 70 teams participating in the National Youth Football Championships have been affected. The four-day tournament ended Saturday.
He said organizers worked with the health district and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention overnight.
"They are saying it is very likely that a player who was sick at home and came to Las Vegas on a bus likely was the cause, and it spread to that team and then to other teams," Gates told KSNV. "The best thing to do now is to manage it with proper hand-washing and following sanitary rules."
He did not immediately return phone calls to The Associated Press on Saturday.
Health officials were trying to determine the common link between those who got sick, Viote said, adding he was unsure when the health district would complete the investigation and release further details.
"It'll be hard to get a number (of sickened people) until the investigation is done," he said. "There are so many factors we don't know yet."
(Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)


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Lebedev's Mus 2 is a cordless computer mouse that looks like a cursor. Despite of its cursor shape, it fits very well in your hand and it is very easy to use. Also, this optical mouse has 800 dpi optical sensor resolution , a frame speed that could reach 2300fps. (via Art Lebedev)
Tetris Table
Jared Kohn created a this table inspired by the game Tetris. This colorful Tetris table looks cool on our backyard garden. (via Jared Kohn)
R2 D2 Trashcan
Here's a detailed model of R2-D2 that acts as your garbage can. The can is avaliable in full-size which stands at 24 inches tall or Desktop model which is smaller. (via Thinkgeek)
Interactive Drum T-Shirt
A drum kit built right into your T-shirt! Tap the drums on this shirt and they actually play through the embedded speaker. This electronic and innovative shirts not only help you appear to be a wannabe rock star, it also help you become somewhat geekier than rock. (via Think Geek)
Social Media Pillows
According to Craftsquatch's shop on Etsy, the pillows are 100% handmade and you need to allow 7-10 days for your item to be shipped because they're made to order. (via Craftsquatch)
The Wearable Keyboard
This unusual wearable gadget is built into a pair of fashionable designer jeans by Erik De Nijs. It has a built-in keyboard, mouse, and computer speakers that play audio. (via Erik De Nijs)
USB Webcam Rocket Launcher
While you're chatting with your buddies on MSN, this Webcam USB Rocket Launcher allows you to do more than just share videos and pictures. With this cool gadget you can wage war on your chat buddy by taking control of his rocket launcher. But beware because he'll be in control of yours. (via)
Super Mario Bros Wall Decals
This is an official Nintendo licensed product. The graphics are so life like, it's like actually watching Super Mario Bros. game on pause. (via Blik company)
The Darth Vader Toaster
Yes, the Sith Lord makes evil toast with an image of Darth Vader. This is the only toaster that takes toast launching to a whole new…the dark side. (via Starwars)
WoW Beer Stein
Handcrafted in the Old-World style with fine-grain stoneware by the world-renowned stein artisans of Ceramarte. Their limited-production steins feature panoramic, bas-relief sculpting of exclusive artwork by top World of Warcraft visionaries. (via 3 Point Entertainment, LLC)
The Tetris Couch
These stylish couch is basically a set of many small couches of different dimensions. Stefano Grasselli make sure is vary in their sizes and shape along with different colors to match the interiors of your living room. (via Stefano Grasselli)
Pacman Sofa
The Pacman Sofa sets is covered in a stain resistant coated fabric and comes in different of colors.
Key Bag
This funky bag was created using 393 randomly arranged old computer keyboards keys. (via Joao Sabino)
Space Invaders Cutting Board
LiveJournal user Capt. Sideburns has posted the results of his experiments in creating a Space Invaders cutting board. No silly colors, he just use the plain graphic in walnut blocks put together into maple to make a pixel art butcher block. (via Capt. Sideburns)
The "PacM" chair
Jose Jorge Hinojosa Primo has come up with an awesome chair that send shivers to all of us that once played the popular maze game. The "PacM," as the designer calls his chair presents a unique, nostalgic and very stylish furniture. This cool chair is only an artist's rendering but it would be ideal for a game room.(via Jose Jorge Hinojosa Primo)
Lego Minifig Foosball Table
One of the coolest foosball I ever seen. This LEGO foosball Table features custom minifigs and an genuine "faux" oak woodgrain finish. (Mt.Dew Monkey)
Text Talk Vinyl Shower Curtain
This shower curtain from Bed Bath & Beyond is a fun addition to your bathroom. Almost all emoticons are clad on the Text Talk curtain, including many I've never even used.(via Bed Bath & Beyond)
Victorinox Secure Pro USB drive
The un-hackable Victorinox Secure features AES256 technology, together with Victorinox patented unique MKI's Schnuffi Platform Single Chip Technology. Victorinox actually offered a £100,000 prize to a group of expert hackers to crack the drive during the company's launch event and they were unable to do so. The Secure Pro is currently available with storage capacities between 8GB and 32GB (via Victorinox)
iCade: iPad Arcade Cabinet
iCad from Thinkgeek, is more than just a docking station for your iPad. You can play your favorite arcade games in this retro styled, handcrafted wooden tabletop arcade cabinet. (via Thinkgeek)
Yoda Plush Backpack
Star Wars fanatics will surely love this backpack. This legitimately licensed Yoda backpack rests comfortably at your back while storing your school work or anything you want to take on the go. (via Thinkgeek)
IP Address Door Mat
Only nerds would recognize that this figures is nothing but IP address, and for geeks ideal home is one's own machine and one's own IP address. (via Nicole and Tyler)
Superman Hanger
This stylish Superman Hanger is designed by Roman Ficek and available at ComuniStar – a Slovakian company that manufacture unique modern interior and furniture accessories. (via Roman Ficek)
Iceblox Ice Cube Puzzle Tray
Serving drinks with Tetris shaped ice-cubes is absolutely going to get your visitors to notice the drinks and they will surely for more of them. (via Thinkgeek)
iPhone App Magnets
Can't get enough of those small apps icons on your iPhone? Attach those cute icons on your fridge or your bulletin board with this cool set of magnetic iPhone app icons. (via Jailbreaktoys)
Lego Star Wars Alarm Clock
This super geeky clock is made of 21 Lego pieces and features Japanese Quartz movement and a crescendo alarm that gets louder and louder until you turn it off. (via Thinkgeek)
8-Bit Hanger
I like the retro style of this 8-bit pointer. This this low-res hook will able to hold some of your other stuffs like bag, shirt, caps, earphones, etc. (via Meninos)
Sudoku Toilet Paper
Honestly, I don't know how to play Sudoku but I think Sudoku fans will like this. Pull down the roll and start filling in the sudoku puzzles. (via Ozgadgets)
Yoda and Darth Vader Lightsaber Chopsticks Set
Check out Chopsabers, a Lightsabers merge with Japanese culture. May the Force be with you at every meal! (via Starwars)
Layers Frame Horizontal
Picture in 10 x 15 cm will fit in this cool picture frame. (via Meninos)
Reddit Alien Soap
Reddit has partnered with soapmaker, Soapier to make the Reddit Alien Soap. Its 10 ozs of high quality vegetable glycerin soap and comes in 2 different fragrances, orange and bacon! Digg users can try it too :) (via Soapier)
Save Key Bank
This geeky piggybank has a slot in top for coins and a base that pops off easily if you're out of change. The bad thing is, at $9.75 it just about costs more than the amount of coins it can hold.
Halo Helmet
For you Halo fans out there, this badass helmet is modeled after "authentic" Spartan Mjolnir Mark VI head gear. This Halo Helmet is made out of "high impact" polystyrene, similar to the assembly of a motorcycle helmet. (via Kotaku)
Star Wars Death Star Planetarium
This Death Star Planetarium will convert your room into a personal planetarium. It will project the stunning beauty of milky way galaxy on the ceiling of your room. (via Starwars)
Game-inspired energy drinks
I want one of these cool-looking cans along with the other game-related drink. Not to drink it but to collect and display it on my room. (via GkWorld)


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Update from Team 1040: "Mike Gillis says still nothing imminent regarding a possible Luongo trade."
Vancouver Sun's Brad Ziemer: "Gillis vague on status of Luongo trade talks. Says sometimes you think you are close and things change."
From George Richards, who reported the earlier rumour about Luongo's pending return to Forida, tweeted: "#FlaPanthers asst GM Mike Santos says they haven't spoken to #Canucks since draft."
Miami Herald reporter George Richards tweeted the following about an hour ago:
Word on street is ª#FlaPanthers¬ are internally getting ready for the return of Roberto Luongo
As discussed this morning, GM Dale Tallon bought out Matt Bradley and waived Mike Santorelli yesterday. This report comes on the heels of Darren Dreger calling the Panthers the clear front runners.
If this does indeed go down, all of Leafs Nation will be curiously awaiting news of the return headed Vancouver's way.


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Alumni Profile
From AU to Cannes: Alumna Sonya Dunn Thrives Behind the Camera
Sonya Dunn, SOC/MA '13, just returned from the Cannes Film Festival where her short film, The Bedroom, was screened. It is the first AU student film to be screened at the prestigious event.
"It was a once in a lifetime opportunity. I learned so much from the experience, and I was able to network with other production companies and discuss possible collaborations," she says.
The Bedroom chronicles a marital relationship and how couples struggle to stay connected. "It's a tragic drama about everlasting love and overcoming obstacles and tragedy. Everybody's in love and miserable at the same time."
Filmmaking has been a lifelong fascination for Sonya. "Ever since I was little, I've always had the desire to be either in front of the camera or behind the camera. In college [at the University of Central Oklahoma], I learned about production and post-production. I fell in love with being behind the camera and have been there ever since," she says.
Sonya spent a number of years in the film industry and even started her own production company, JEMH Productions, before pursuing her master's degree in producing for film and video.
She chose AU because, she says, "I wanted to take my career to the next level. I felt American University was a good fit for me to advance my education in the field of media production. I'd always been on the creative side, and I hadn't delved into the business side. [Going to AU] allowed me to attend school and continue working on projects. … [AU has] a gold mine of instructors in our field who give us knowledge to expand on our experiences."
Professor Russell Williams – a two-time Oscar winner – was instrumental, Sonya says, in her education and helped with the post-production of The Bedroom. "With him, I was able to take my [post-production] skills to another level and understand the true collaboration of editing and sound in film. That alone was a priceless lesson for me to learn."
"Being at AU has been a godsend. I've learned so much about the business side of producing. As a filmmaker, we sometimes get caught up in making the film and don't pay much attention to the strategy of marketing the film once it's done. … American University has taught me about the whole collaboration from pre-production to distribution and everything in between," Sonya says.
The Bedroom has an accompanying book that will be released in September, shortly before the film is released. Although Sonya can't talk about her current and future projects in detail, it's clear from her success thus far, she is well on her way to becoming a media mogul.


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WhyDid or Why Don't: Jam Packed
Speaking of the end of summer, looks like school's back in session. And even if you aren't actually headed back to class, it seems that backpacks are making a bit of a comeback for fall. You may remember the tiny backpacks of the mid-90's having a moment (oh, yes you do, Cher Horowitz), but this rendition is a bit bulkier and crafted in leathers and coated fabrics rather than canvases and corduroys… meaning you might actually be able to fit more in them than lip gloss and a tampon. Dare I say even a real— book?! And while these aren't your run of the mill Jansports, I'm not sure I can get on board with the book bag look.
1. Topshop Studded Denim Backpack, $70, 2. Alexander Wang Marti Backpack, $850, 3. Theyskens' Theory Vera Backpack, $695, 4. Rag & Bone Coated Backpack, $275, 5.3.1 Phillip Lim Drop Down Backpack, $995, 6. Madewell Leather Backpack, $248, 7. Topshop Large Washed Clip Backpack, $72, 8. Pierre Hardy Leopard Print Suede Backpack, $1,650, 9. MCM Backpack Stark, $850, 10. Foley & Corinna Simpatico Backpack, $450,
What do you think? Will you be tossing your tote for a backpack?
image via Examiner


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This article is more than 1 year old
SonicWALL licensing snafu short-circuits protection
Reset to FAIL
SonicWALL has apologised for a license server outage that left some customers without firewall or email filtering protection for hours yesterday.
The snafu affected enterise users of SonicWALL UTM Firewall, Email Security, Content Security appliances and meant that content filter, intrusion prevention and antivirus protection for some of its users were temporarily "switched off" because of reset license keys that were treated as invalid.
"Beginning 12/2/2008 approximately 2:00 AM Pacific time, some SonicWALL products contacting a particular SonicWALL licensing server began receiving erroneous responses. This issue may have caused the products' license keys to be reset, and in some cases may have affected the products' operation," SonicWALL said in a statement on its site.
"The issue has been corrected and all servers and licensing functions have been restored," it added.
The security firm has posted instructions on how to resynchronise affected systems with licensing servers.
SonicWALL is a well-regarded mid-range firewall vendor that competes with the likes of Fortinet (most directly), as well as Cisco and Juniper. It's unclear how many of its customers were affected by Tuesday's snafu, which was serious and of a type we've seldom encountered before.
False positives for Windows Genuine Advantage left users unable to download updates from the software giant last year. Two years ago a renewals affected Symantec shops. But both these pale in comparison to the effects of Tuesday's SonicWALL SNAFU, which left some users suddenly stranded without protection.
The issue was brought to our attention by Reg Rip who reports that the licensing server woes left some firewall users exposed for up to 12 hours on Tuesday. Computerworld adds that SonicWALL's customer support section has filed up with adverse comments about the issue, particularly from a shop reportedly flooded with a deluge of spam and malware as a result of the glitch. SonicWALL offered manual workarounds during the incident but it seems these were far from universally effective. ®


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City councillors voted Wednesday to move forward with a revised deal for the downtown arena project, with construction slated to begin as early as August and completion set for 2016.
All councillors except Linda Sloan, Kerry Diotte and Don Iveson voted in favour of a revised design and negotiated framework, which is expected to cost $601 million in total.
"This has not been an easy road," Mayor Stephen Mandel said after the vote was made.
He said the new arena is about "more than just a place to play hockey," and that it is a big part of helping build Edmonton.
After the vote was made, Mandel had a brief phone conversation with Oilers owner Daryl Katz.
Mandel said Katz told him he was "pleased" the negotiations are now behind them and "we can move forward."
Katz later issued a statement, saying the new agreement "will drive ongoing revitalization of downtown Edmonton."
"It also helps to ensure the Oilers' long-term sustainability in Edmonton. This has been a challenging process for all concerned but we are confident we will all look back on the end result with pride and satisfaction at what we have achieved," Katz said in the statement.
"This is a great day for Edmonton and we are excited to get to work on realizing this incredible opportunity."
Click here for the city's official downtown arena and entertainment district page.
A master agreement on the project is expected to go before council in March.
City administration presented three options for the downtown arena and a recommendation to move forward with one of those options, on Wednesday.
The option recommended and voted on by councillors – Option A - is similar to the design agreed upon in the October 2011 framework, which included the winter garden and underground parkade.
It is budgeted at a total cost of $601 million – with the arena itself costing $480-million.
The city would contribute $219 million to the overall cost, while the Katz Group would put in $143 million, a ticket surcharge would cover $125 million, and an additional $114 million would be provided by contributions from the provincial and federal governments.
Options B and C had lower overall costs and fewer amenities – but City Manager Simon Farbrother said the city would be contributing roughly the same amount for each of the options.
"When you look at the value added in terms of year-round access across 104 Avenue we believe Option A is the best design," Farbrother said.
All of the options had the arena featuring 18,559 seats.
Arena project costs broken down
The $480 million arena cost is $30 million higher than the previous agreed-upon price.
The city and the Katz Group would split the extra cost 50-50, with each group covering an extra $15 million.
The Katz Group's portion would be added to the $100 million the Oilers owner already promised, which would be paid over the next 35 years, through a lease payment agreement.
Additional costs include a community rink ($21 million), winter garden ($53 million), LRT Connection ($7 million), and pedestrian link ($15M).
Farbrother said the LRT connection cost was decreased from $17 million to $7 million.
The city will also fund a $25 million portion of the winter garden, with the Katz Group covering the rest – the element was originally capped at $50 million.
At Wednesday's arena update, Farbrother presented the new negotiated framework for the arena project, which included price changes.
"In relation to the numbers we presented to you in New York, we believe the financial arrangement is reasonable," Farbrother said.
"It realizes the city's vision in bringing an arena to the downtown core."
"The way we're getting there is not right."
During questioning, Coun. Tony Caterina wondered whether the city would be responsible for coming up with additional funding if other levels of government do not get involved.
Farbrother said the city will request $107 million from the province and $7 million from the federal government - to cover $100 million for the arena and $14 million for the community rink.
He says Mayor Mandel has been "actively" addressing that issue.
Mandel said he is very confident that the city will be able to get the additional funding from the province and federal government.
The missing money was a sticking point for Diotte, who voted against the new negotiated framework.
"This should not have even been proceeding until that money was firmed up," Diotte said.
While he supports the idea of a downtown arena, Diotte did not believe what was presented on Wednesday was the best approach.
"The way we're getting there is not right," he said, insisting the deal is not good for taxpayers and the financial details are still unclear.
"A lot of people run very successful businesses in this city but they don't get public money to build their factories."
Mandel reiterated that taxpayers shouldn't worry.
"This is taking money we already have and finding uses to use it better," he said.
Coun. Iveson expressed concerns that the arena framework as is works as a subsidy for the
"The entire deal is an indirect subsidy to NHL," Iveson said, adding that the deal is an "open wound" for Edmonton.
The city also said Wednesday that they require the province's approval before moving ahead with the Community Revitalization Levy (CRL).
The city's chief financial officer Lorna Rosen said administration has been in talks with the province to draft the CRL and the next meeting with the province on the CRL is expected in February.
Councillors on Wednesday also questioned the Katz Group on whether they could guarantee they would not return to the city requesting more money, if Wednesday's framework was approved.
"We think that we can live with this (deal) for 35 years," Karvellas said, adding Katz has approved of the new framework and summary.
"There is no intention to revisit the deal with the city."
The mayor reiterated that comment after the vote was made.
"This is 100 per cent. A deal is done," Mandel said.
Oilers players talk new arena
Members of the Katz Group, and Edmonton Oilers President and CEO Patrick LaForge, along with a number of Oilers team members including Shawn Horcoff, Taylor Hall and Jordan Eberle, were also present at Wednesday's update.
Before the vote was made, Horcoff and Eberle told media how important the new arena deal was for players and fans.
"We feel it's an important part of our future as players. We all want to see a deal get down, we all want to see a new arena, I think it's exciting for the city, it's exciting for fans," Horcoff said.
Negotiations for the proposed downtown arena project took a step backwards last fall, when councillors voted to cease negotiations.
In December, councillors voted to resume negotiations with the Katz Group, based on the framework the two parties had agreed upon in October 2011 - but this time a third-party mediator would also be involved and appointed by Jan. 23.
On Wednesday, Farbrother said administration decided not pursue a third-party mediator because it did not end up being needed in order for the two parties to come to an agreement on the new negotiated framework.
Click here to see the report and negotiated framework presented to councillors.
Farbrother noted NHL commissioner Gary Bettman's attendance to a meeting last Friday was not as mediator, but just to address and help the two parties resolve "two or three outstanding issues."
Construction for the new arena is expected to begin in the late summer or early fall of this year.
The arena is expected to be completed in 2016.


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How Advances in Digital Film Making and Exhibition
Are Destined to Radically Alter Your Movie Going Experience
The feature film industry is
entering a new era of technological advances that are challenging many of the
old ways of thinking about filmmaking.
More significant, these advances promise to dramatically change the expectations
and experiences of movie going audiences.
Some technological changes are responsible for the emergence of contemporary
high-quality 3D movies while other innovations have been triggered by the popularity
of 3D movies.
the last decade, little has changed in the manner in which feature films are
made nor how feature films are exhibited to audiences. Film formats have come and gone and color
became ubiquitous in the U.S. during the late 60's. However, in the last decade
we've seen what is arguably the most significant advancement in feature film
technology. Sometimes referred to as the
"Digital Age of Cinema," the early 2000's saw Hollywood accepting the fact that
film may no longer be the dominant medium for making and exhibiting movies,
paving the way for digital cinema to become the default standard.
the dawn of digital cinema marked the end of an era in film-making. I remember in
the late '90s when a few film purists, archivists and directors bemoaned the
fact that the rich texture of film grain and the 'breathing' of film as it
passed through the projection shutters gives a feature film an organic feel
that should never be lost. They
considered it an essential part of the art of film-making.
Indeed to some, it was part of the art back in the day. Today—with the use of digital cameras, the digital intermediate process and digital cinema exhibition—the nuances of natural film grain and film weave are gone. When grain is desired, it is typically a visual effect rather than a natural aspect of the medium.
The Digital Intermediate
course, many directors still shoot on film stock. When Legend3D converted the majority of Transformers: Dark of the Moon 2D-to-3D
shots, we accommodated Michael Bay's preference for shooting actors on
anamorphic 35mm film. Since film is a single
camera, 2D process there was no other way to inter-cut those shots within the 3D
film without meticulously executed 2D to 3D conversion of each frame of the
film. There are many other directors who, like Michael, prefer the look and
feel of film stock for certain type of shots. But regardless, how images are captured,
the common denominator today and one of the most significant advances in the
history of post-production is the Digital Intermediate (DI) process where all
forms of media within a feature film are converted to a digital conform. Whether a title is shot on film stock, shot
with digital cameras, created entirely in CG or converted from 2D-to-3D, DI has
become the norm in post-production and as far as feature film exhibitors are
concerned 35mm distribution prints are all but being replaced by digital
projection systems worldwide.
Digital Film
Production Makes 3D Possible.
contemporary creative and technical filmmakers have come to accept the inevitable;
"digital is here to stay." Actually, I
don't think there are many legacy creative types who miss the tactile sensation
of celluloid or polyester running through their hands, or the technical skills and
patience that accompany the use of splicers and glue and the periscopic
experience of viewing edits on a Moviola or on the later flatbeds.
Those days are largely gone and today's film
professionals are more comfortable with a keyboard and a mouse. In addition to all the superior visual
effects, compositing, digital color grading, etc. that DI has given us, one of
the most important advantages of digital film production is that it has ushered
in the age of stereo theatrical exhibition.
Without digital projection, 3D would have an insurmountable hill to
climb to gain acceptance. As recently as
two years ago, there were attempts to employ analog film for 3D exhibition, but
those attempts were met with criticism that analog 3D film projection—even
though it was not the old fashioned red/blue or cyan anaglyph—represented a
step backward. Analog film formats for stereo, often called "over and under"
are still around though most professionals do not consider it a lasting format.
Higher Spatial Resolution
to the life and death implications of digital radiology not to mention the huge
revenue opportunities of that industry to the medical community, the giant
radiology equipment manufacturers like Siemens, GE, etc have historically partnered
with the major teaching hospitals around the country, allocating enormous
R&D budgets in an effort to push the state of the art as far as conceivably
possible. As a result, medical imaging has always been
considered the pinnacle of imaging quality and resolution demands. That is until now. Today, digital cinema is considering the
introduction of spatial resolution and dynamic range solutions for digital
cinema that actually come close to exceeding the gold standard of medical
imaging, diagnostic mammography. Before my entry into visual effects, my focus
was on neurobiological and medical research and my career spanned the
pioneering eras of neuroscience and digital medical imaging. In fact medical imaging was the original foundation
of the Legend3D process and I frequently refer back to that technology when
assessing current and future trends in feature film capture and exhibition. Back in the 80's and 90's the Holy Grail of diagnostic
medical imaging was 4K, 10bits for mammography. That was valued as the closest approximation to
analog x-ray film and was the lowest resolution considered optimal for the clinical
detection of minute calcifications and early stage cancerous breast
anomalies. However, the capture, display
and storage technology at the time was not sufficiently advanced to handle that
kind of data throughput. Today mammography
remains in the 2K to 4K range with some scanning sensors delivering up to 6K at
14 bits. However, the 4K standard
remains the minimum resolution for much of diagnostic radiology. It took a long time for diagnostic radiology to
move up to 4K and it's an even bigger step for digital cinema. Today filmmakers
have 8K cameras in their toolbox as well as super resolution scanners that subsequently
down-sample to 4K. Some people call some of the higher resolution solutions above
4K "faux resolution" because the full capture resolution is not realized on the
output but instead is used to calculate a lower resolution of 4K image. However, it's been demonstrated that down
sampling does appear to improve resolution as well as contrast and will
undoubtedly be a giant step for theatrical exhibition. However, getting these advances installed
world wide will be a significant task because the vast majority of theaters
around the world currently exhibit feature films at a maximum resolution of 2K,
so to exhibit 4K movies there has to be an upgrade in projectors and also an
upgrade in servers due to the added bandwidth.
The real benefit of higher spatial resolution is the ability to install
much larger screens. However, once again
we have a cost benefit ratio that the exhibitors will have to tackle and one that does not necessarily come
out positive on the side of further advancement.
Interest in Higher
Frame Rates For 3D
is another contribution to higher spatial resolution in feature film commonly
referred to as temporal resolution. Whether scanned from film or directly
captured from digital cameras, 24 frames per second creates an additional
dimension of "time" which significantly increases the effective spatial
resolution on the big screen; offering a perceptual resolution actually greater
than 2K or 4K. This coupled with down
sampling from 8K and higher physical spatial resolutions could eventually
produce super high-resolution feature film exhibition. But it doesn't stop there. Temporal resolution is about to have an even
greater influence on the movie going experience with the latest interest in
introducing high frame rates that are well above 24 frames per second.
we have been hearing a good deal about higher frame rates, particularly from
Peter Jackson who is shooting The Hobbit
in 3D at 48 frames per second.
well known in the Industry that 24 frames per second originally became the
standard for film because 24 frames was the slowest that film could run through
the projector with reasonable fidelity for the first sound on film formats from
Western Electric. It was an arbitrary
number that was intended to save money on film stock yet it was fast enough to
allow for sound.
For an in-depth
commentary on frame rates I'd like to direct you to the excellent Scott
Squires' blog, "The Effects Corner".
today's digital world we are close to no longer have restrictions on frame rate
for exhibition and in addition to Peter Jackson's use of 48 frames per second
on The Hobbit there is also talk of
60 or even 120 frames per second in an attempt to give the audience a more
realistic 3D visual experience. One
advantage of the higher frame rates for 3D is that it removes a great deal of
motion-blur, which tends to cause visual stuttering when an object is rapidly
moving horizontally across the screen. However,
one consequence of higher frame rates sometimes considered negative is the loss
of grain, even artificially inserted. Some say that 48 frames per second and
higher comes across as "live" video. I
believe that any objections to the look created by higher frame rates are simply
due to the fact that we are not yet used to it. Certainly, you can have an immersive 3D
experience with 24 frames per second or any of the higher frame rates being
proposed. I believe that in the right hands, the different frame rates above 24
frames per second can profoundly change the 3D visual experience for the better,
particularly when considering advances in higher physical spatial resolution
mentioned above. How VFX pipelines will
handle these higher frame rates and their massive increase in data has yet to
be determined as well as how the resulting increase in bandwidth requirements will
be accommodated within the Blu-ray format.
However one thing is certain— increased frame rates will create a whole
new, more vivid visual experience for the movie going audience.
will 3D, higher spatial resolution and higher frame rates become the new
standard? Or should they be considered simply another part of the director's
tool-box or toy-box? Up for consideration is whether 3D is appropriate for all
genres? To me, the fact that four out of five of the top-grossing movies of all
time are 3D makes that a moot question. Aside from its obvious appeal to
audiences, I personally, believe that proper creative execution of 3D can
enhance any feature film genre. However, it's highly questionable whether increased
frame rates are appropriate for all films or film genre. Budgetary and technical considerations aside,
3D and higher frame rates, like film grain and black and white, should probably
be a creative consideration by the filmmaker and there is little doubt that many
filmmakers will continue to prefer shooting and exhibiting their feature films
in 2D at 24 frames per second. As for
higher spatial resolution, it certainly would seem to make sense for
significantly bigger screens than we are used to at our local Cineplex, but
does it add enough to warrant the additional production expense considering
amount of data already being generated by 3D and higher frame rates? With
exhibitors just recovering from conversion to digital and 3D, will they see the
cost benefit of the necessary build out and retrofits as well as the cost of
new projectors? I believe it is not
likely for a long time. As far as the
home theater industry is concerned, we are already working with 240hz and
higher frame rates in HDTV 3D sets that greatly increases the perceptual
resolution but I don't believe that higher resolution will motivate the
purchase of new TVs. In fact, until you
get to 55" displays, resolution above HD is probably not a significant
differentiator. On the other hand, I
believe quality 3D at higher frame rates will motivate consumers to upgrade.
a visual effects innovator for the past 25 plus years, I'm the last person to
join some critics suggesting that particular technological advancements in
moviemaking and exhibition should be discouraged, avoided or not considered at
all. Regardless of the technology
employed, it's the quality of the story and the talent of the creative and
technical filmmakers that make or break a movie. If new and even radical technological
advances can help filmmakers create more compelling visual stories then I say, bring
it on. Just remember to consider the
enormous bandwidth and storage demands on production from the beginning to the end
of their pipelines and the consequent cost to the studios, visual effects
houses, conversion vendors, post production houses and last but certainly not
least, the exhibitors.
like to thank my colleagues, Garrett Smith and Rob Hummel for reviewing this
blog and the invaluable suggestions and edits offered:
J. Smith
is currently CTO of Ha Productions based in Santa Barbara. He previously served
as vice president, production technology and digital mastering operations at
Paramount Pictures. During his 24-year tenure at Paramount, Garrett
participated in the development of DVD, HDTV and Digital Cinema Initiatives.
Prior to Paramount Pictures, he worked in various post-production positions
including; post-production supervisor for "Ripley's Believe It or Not";
director, post-production for Columbia Pictures Television; and manager, film
services at CBS Network Television. Garrett is a member of the Academy of
Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and serves on the Science and Technology
Council. He is also an associate member of the American Society of
Cinematographers and an adjunct associate professor at the USC School of
Cinematic Arts.
is the President of Group 47, Inc. Formed to acquire and improve upon the
technology behind DOTS; the advanced digital archival storage media originally
developed by Eastman Kodak. Previously, Rob was President of Legend3D, the
leading 2D to 3D conversion services company for major motion pictures and
television. He was the chief liaison
between Legend and film studios, using innovative solutions to enable studios
to convert movies into 3D efficiently and economically. He began his career as
the director of production services for the Technicolor Laboratories, and then
moved on to Douglas Trumbull's visual effects company during the making of
Blade Runner (1982) and to post-production work on Tron (1982). A former president of DALSA Digital Cinema,
Hummel has also served as senior vice president of production technology at
Warner Bros., where he oversaw digital post-production (mastering films for
digital cinema, HDTV, DVD, etc.) and digital restoration work on such classics
as "Gone with the Wind" and "The Wizard of Oz."
He previously worked in
post-production, animation and Imagineering at Walt Disney Studios, headed
animation technology at DreamWorks, and helped launch digital cinema units at
Technicolor and Sony. Hummel currently serves as the Chair of the
Public Programs Committee of Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences'
Science and Technology Council and sits on the Scientific and Technical Awards
Committee. Rob has hosted several
programs at the Academy on Film Formats, Film Technology, and 3D Stereoscopic
Imaging. He is also an associate member
of the American Society of Cinematographers and editor of the 8th edition of
the American Cinematographer, and authored most of its articles. Rob has taught
classes at the USC and the UCLA and is an Honorary Visiting Professor at the
Kanazawa Institute of Technology in Japan.


text:
Sadly, Pam had a bad accident while riding her bike on Sunday, December 15, 2013. On Tuesday, December 17, Hugh Murphy wrote: "Our friend Pam Leven, the President of the Los Angeles Wheelmen, is in need of our prayers. I just spoke with Kermit Ganier a few minutes ago. Kermit said she was involved in a cyclist/cyclist wreck last weekend. She has major head trauma. Things do not sound good. Please send lots of prayers and healing thoughts Pam's way."
Roland Hoffman wrote: "Oh NO! Pam and Kermit inspired me to do the quad in 2011. She will be included in our Hoffman family daily prayer towards a complete and speedy recovery. Love ya, Pam!!!!!!!"
On Wednesday, December 18, Roland wrote: "For those that may not know, LA Wheelmen's 2013 / 2014 President, Pam Leven was involved in a cycling incident last Sunday, December 15th, while riding the LA Wheelmen's "Newcomer's Ride" in the West LA / Brentwood area.
I have just spoke with Kermit regarding the incident and Pam's current condition. As the group was making a safe and routine left turn from Sunset Blvd., she got tangled up with another experienced cyclist that was next to her within the group. They both went down onto the pavement. While the experienced rider has escaped serious injury, Pam is currently at UCLA Medical Center in critical condition with severe head trauma.
Let's ALL hold our virtual hands in unity . . . as we send our healing prayers together in hopes our Lord brings his healing hand down onto Pam as we pray with all of our might towards Pam's most challenging moments of her life.
Lord . . . . hear our prayers."
On Thursday, December 19, Kermit called Chuck. Sadly Pam was taken off life support at 2:15pm and she passed away at 3pm.
Pam Leven was an amazing woman and a friend to us all. She has been a major partner for Kermit allowing the LA Wheelmen to organize the Grand Tour and Dead of Winter Doubles so well for many years now.
"When someone dies, you don't 'get over it' by forgetting.
You 'get over it' by remembering."
Leslie Marmon
Let's keep the memories of Pam alive for years to come here.
Pam was a HUGE supporter and organizer of the Los Angeles Wheelmen's Grand Tour. Her California Triple Crown History Report can be found HERE.
Roland wrote: "Calling our California Triple Crown "family" from near and far, we grasp our virtual hands in unity as the President of the LA Wheelmen Bicycle Club, Pam Leven has left us in passing at 3:00pm today at UCLA Medical Center in Westwood, CA.
She was a dynamic leader with the LA Wheelmen as she would head and participate in many of the club's events, including the original double century in the country, the Grand Tour. She loved to be with her cycling "family" within the club, and throughout the cycling community.
Pam is survived by her loving and supporting husband, Bob Geddes.
As we hold our virtual hands together, we bow our heads in unity as we bless Pam - as she heads into the heavens where our Lord will await her arrival to praise her highly for her dedication, kindness, enthusiasm, and her shear attention to needs and support for us all here on Earth. Her mission on Earth is now complete.
May peace be with you Pam, as you have been and continue to be loved by everyone that had the great pleasure of growing with you, learning with you, working with you, riding with you, and especially knowing you. May the tears from our eyes cleanse you during your "final ride" into the heavens as we praise your name from our hearts and soul . . . with tailwinds - always.
RIP Pam
~Roland Hoffman
California Triple Crown History"


text:
This was published 5 years ago
New York sues Trump, alleging his charity engaged in 'illegal conduct'
By David A. Fahrenthold
The New York Attorney-General has filed a suit against President Donald Trump and his three eldest children alleging "persistently illegal conduct" at the President's personal charity, saying Trump repeatedly misused the nonprofit - to pay off his businesses' creditors, to decorate one of his golf clubs and to stage a multimillion dollar giveaway at his 2016 campaign events.
In the suit, filed on Thursday morning in New York, Attorney-General Barbara Underwood asked a state judge to dissolve the Donald J. Trump Foundation. She asked that its remaining $US1 million ($1.3 million) in assets be distributed to other charities and that Trump be forced to pay at least $US2.8 million in restitution and penalties.
Underwood also asks that Trump be banned from leading any other New York nonprofit for 10 years - seeking to apply a penalty usually reserved for the operators of small-time charity frauds to the President of the United States.
In the suit, Underwood noted that Trump had already paid more than $US330,000 in reimbursements and penalty taxes since 2016. New York state began probing the Trump Foundation in response to an investigation by The Washington Post.
But she asked the judge to go further, and require Trump to pay millions more. She said a 20-month state investigation found that Trump had repeatedly violated laws that set the ground rules for tax-exempt foundations - most importantly, that their money is meant to serve the public good, and not to provide private benefits to their founders.
"This resulted in multiple violations of state and federal law," Underwood wrote in the legal complaint.
The White House and the Trump Organisation did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Trump has been president of the foundation since he founded it in 1987. In late 2016, he had promised to shut down the Trump Foundation but could not while the Attorney-General's investigation continued.
Underwood was promoted to the position of Attorney-General only weeks ago, succeeding Democrat Eric Schneiderman after he resigned following allegations that he had physically abused several romantic partners. Underwood was a career staffer, not an elected official. She has promised not to seek election for a full term as Attorney-General later this year.
Underwood declined to comment on the case beyond issuing a written statement. "As our investigation reveals, the Trump Foundation was little more than a book for payments from Mr Trump or his businesses to nonprofits, regardless of their purpose or legality," Underwood said in the statement.
Underwood said she had sent letters to both the IRS and the Federal Election Commission, identifying what she called "possible violations" of tax law and federal campaign law by Trump's foundation.
Underwood has jurisdiction over the Trump Foundation because the charity is based at Trump Tower in Manhattan and registered in New York State.
Trump's children Donald Trump jnr, Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump were also named in the lawsuit because they have been official board members of the Donald J. Trump Foundation for years. Under the law, Underwood said, board members are supposed to scrutinise a charity's spending for signs that its leader - in this case, their father - was misusing the funds.
But in reality, Underwood wrote, the three Trump children exercised no such oversight. The board had not actually met since 1999.
"The Foundation's directors failed to meet basic fiduciary duties and abdicated all responsibility for ensuring that the Foundation's assets were used in compliance with the law," Underwood wrote.
She asked the judge to ban each of the three from serving as a director of a New York nonprofit for a year. It was not clear if any of the three are serving currently on the board of any such charities: Eric Trump, for instance, stepped down from the board of the Eric Trump Foundation after the 2016 election, and the charity was renamed Curetivity.
Although Trump's name is on the foundation, in recent years most of its money was not actually his. Trump did not give any donation to the Trump foundation between 2008 and 2015 - instead, its largest benefactors in recent years have been wrestling moguls Vince and Linda McMahon, who gave $US5 million total in 2007 and 2009. Linda McMahon was later appointed by Trump as head of the Small Business Administration. The McMahons have declined to answer questions about the reasons for their gifts.
The lawsuit shows that the Trump Foundation - which Trump founded to give away some of the royalties from his 1987 book The Art of the Deal - looked, on paper, like other tax-exempt nonprofits. It filed annual reports with New York state and the IRS. It listed directors and donations.
But behind the scenes, Underwood said, the foundation was essentially one of Trump's personal chequebooks - a pool of funds that his accounting clerks knew to use whenever Trump wanted to pay money to a nonprofit. By law, Trump wasn't allowed to buy things for himself using the charity's money, even if he was buying them from nonprofits.
At one point, during a deposition, a New York state investigator asked Allen Weisselberg - a Trump Organisation employee who was also listed as treasurer for the Trump Foundation - if the foundation had a policy for determining which specific payments the foundation was allowed to make.
"There's no policy, just so you understand," Weisselberg said. The interviewer asked if Weisselberg had understood he was actually on the board of the Trump Foundation, and had been for more than a decade.
"I did not," Weisselberg said.
With no outside oversight over Trump's use of foundation funds, Underwood said, the future president had repeatedly used his charity's money to help his businesses, and himself.
Twice, for instance, Trump used the charity's money to settle legal disputes that involved his for-profits businesses.
In 2007, he settled a dispute with the town of Palm Beach over code violations at Trump's Mar-a-Lago Club. The town agreed to waive outstanding fines if Mar-a-Lago gave $US100,000 to a charity.
But the donation, to an organisation called Fisher House, came instead from the foundation, Underwood said - after Trump wrote a note to Weisselberg. "Allen W, DJT Foundation, $100,000 to Fisher House (Settlement of flag issue in Palm Beach)," said the note, which is included in the lawsuit.
In addition, in 2012, a Trump golf club agreed to pay $US158,000 to settle a lawsuit with a man who was denied a $US1 million hole-in-one prize during a tournament at the club. The Trump Foundation paid the money instead of the club, Underwood said.
Both of those payments were first reported by The Washington Post. In March, after the Attorney-General's investigation was underway, Trump repaid his foundation all $US258,000, plus more than $US12,000 in interest, Underwood said.
Underwood also listed several smaller instances of what she called "self-dealing," meaning Trump using foundation money to help his businesses. The charity paid $US5,000 to put an ad for Trump hotels in the program for a charity gala. It paid $US32,000 to satisfy an obligation of a Trump company that manages a New York estate. It paid $US10,000 to buy a portrait of Trump, which was later found hanging in the sports bar at Trump's Doral golf resort.
Underwood said Trump had already repaid amounts spent by the foundation, plus penalty taxes totaling more than $US4,000.
In the case of the portrait, she said Trump's golf club had now paid the foundation the "fair rental value" of using the foundation-owned painting as decoration. The value: $US182.
IRS rules also prohibit tax-exempt foundations from aiding political campaigns. But Underwood listed two instances where Trump's foundation had seemed to do so.
In August 2013, Trump donated $US25,000 from his foundation to a Florida political group aiding the re-election of state Attorney-General Pam Bondi, a Republican. Around the same time, Bondi's office was considering whether to join an ongoing lawsuit by Schneiderman, then the New York Attorney-General, alleging Trump had defrauded students at his now-defunct "Trump University".
Afterward, the Trump Foundation omitted any mention of Bondi's political group - called And Justice for All - from its annual report to the IRS, and instead said the $US25,000 donation had gone to a nonprofit in Kansas with a similar-sounding name.
Underwood said Trump's staff blamed confusion among accounting clerks for spending the foundation's money, instead of Trump's own. As for the incorrect IRS filing, Underwood wrote, "the Foundation has no credible explanation for the false reporting of grant recipients".
After The Post reported on this donation to Bondi's group in 2016, Trump repaid the $US25,000 and paid a penalty tax of $US2,500 for an improper political gift.
But Underwood alleged that the campaign Trump's foundation helped most was his own.
In January 2016, Trump skipped a debate among Republican candidates because he was feuding with Fox News, the debate's host. Instead, Trump held a televised fundraiser for veterans - drawing millions from wealthy friends and small-dollar donors, and giving much of it to the Trump Foundation.
Underwood said that, afterward, "the Foundation ceded control over the charitable funds it raised to senior Trump Campaign staff." She cited emails in which Corey Lewandowski, Trump's then-campaign manager, directed which veterans' charities should receive money.
At one point, Lewandowski emailed Weisselberg to ask if the Trump Foundation's money could be ready to distribute during Trump's last campaign events before the Iowa caucuses: "Is there any way we can make some disbursements [from the proceeds of the fundraiser] this week while in Iowa? Specifically on Saturday," Lewandowski wrote, in an email cited by Underwood.
At one point, the lawsuit says, Trump actually gave out an oversized $US100,000 "Trump Foundation" cheque to a charity at a campaign event in Council Bluffs, Iowa.
The problem: nobody appears to have told the Trump Foundation.
"This 'check' was given out (see video). This is not one of the charities we've cut a check to yet. Are there other charities like this?" wrote Jeff McConney, a Trump Organisation staffer, in an email to Lewandowski cited in the lawsuit.
The cheque was later cut.
In 2016, Trump sought to excuse his foundation's actions in a letter to the New York attorney general, saying that the Iowa fundraiser was a charity event. "This statement was false," Underwood wrote, "because, in reality, the Fundraiser was a Trump Campaign event in which the Foundation participated."
She wrote that Trump had repeatedly signed charity documents saying that nonprofits like his were not allowed to become involved in political campaigns. "Mr Trump's wrongful use of the Foundation to benefit his Campaign was willful and knowing," she wrote.
As President, Trump has repeatedly called for the repeal of the Johnson Amendment, a 1954 tax code provision that imposed the ban on political activity by nonprofit groups.
Washington Post


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This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2013, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Washington • Like most Americans, former Rep. Merrill Cook, R-Utah doesn't believe aliens have made contact with Earth, but he promises to keep an open mind as he participates in 30 hours of testimony in a mock hearing later this month.
The "Citizen Hearing on Disclosure" is organized and funded by the Paradigm Research Group, which insists the governments of the United States and other countries are hiding the truth.
"There are extraterrestrials here and the U.S. government's policy since the '40s has been not to acknowledge this," said Stephen Bassett, who asked Cook and four other former members of Congress to participate in the five-day pseudo-hearing at the National Press Club starting April 29.
"I simply want them to conduct themselves as if they were sitting in Congress and conduct a hearing that the Congress won't hold," he said.
Cook says he can do that, but don't expect him to become a believer just because Paradigm is paying him and taking care of travel expenses for him and his wife.
"I made it clear to them that I am unlikely to be persuaded," said Cook, who represented Utah's 2nd Congressional District for two terms starting in 1997. "Extraterrestrial life? I can buy into that as a possibility, but to this day I have not heard or read or seen anything that makes me believe that anyone has encountered one on Earth."
That said, Cook doesn't want to disparage anyone who believes they've seen an unidentified flying object, and he points out that a UFO is merely an unexplained aircraft, not necessarily evidence of life from a far-away planet.
"I never felt I witnessed one," he said. "I am what you might call an open-minded skeptic when it comes to these things. I don't want to imply that anybody has lied about what they think they have seen."
A National Geographic poll conducted in 2012 found that 36 percent of Americans believe in UFOS, 17 percent didn't believe and 50 percent were unsure. The poll didn't identify UFOs as being extraterrestrial.
Bassett hopes that the hearing, which will be webcast and later turned into a documentary, will convince the public, the media and the Congress of the existence of extraterrestrial contact.
The hearing, which will last six hours a day, will include more than 30 witnesses, some of whom are doctors, former members of the military and even ex-employees of NASA.
Cook is the only Republican participating so far. The other former members of Congress who will participate are Sen. Mike Gravel, D-Alaska, Rep. Carolyn Kilpatrick, D-Mich., Rep. Darlene Hooley, D-Ore., and Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif.
Cook, who is a perennial candidate for public office in Utah, doesn't know why Bassett decided to invite him to participate.
"I have no idea," he said. "Maybe I'm just somebody who said yes to them."
Bassett said he sought former members who could participate in such a lengthy event and had served on committees such as Intelligence, Armed Services and Science. Cook was a member of the Science Committee and sat on the subcommittee on space.
And Bassett doesn't care what their views are on the existence of aliens and is not expecting them to take a vote or support his cause at the end of the hearing. He just wants a venue to lay out the evidence.
"There are extraterrestrials engaging us," Bassett said. "This is real and we are not fooling around."
Twitter: @mattcanham


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I need to validate if the provided byte stream is UTF-8.
I need help with start and programming logic. I could accept file which would have byteStream or i could use Scanner and they would input the byteStream. We don't know how long the byte stream is.
I need to make sure that bytestream is UTF-8 validated.
Any Kind of help is appreciated.
Thank You


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Cattle drives call to mind old western films, full of six-shooters and women in hoop skirts who faint delicately at the sight of blood. Most of all, they conjure images of cowboys – complete with hats, belt buckles and worn-in, dusty boots and spurs.
Once a main method of transporting herds to stockyards and markets, cattle drives had their heyday between 1865 and 1895, when more than 10 million cattle were herded between Texas and Kansas for delivery to Chicago and other major cities.
Despite the advent of motorized transportation, ranchers today still use the same basic principles to round up, herd and sort cattle as their cowboy predecessors did more than 100 years ago.
While visiting The Resort at Paws Up, I had the chance to participate in a drive, learning the basics of herding and driving cattle from Mike Doud (pictured at right), a rancher and true cowboy with more than three decades of experience. Before joining the Paws Up team, Mike owned his own ranch and regularly spent days or weeks in the saddle, herding his teams of cattle across thousands of acres.
Mike and his cowboy cohort Max, along with their two dogs, regularly lead guests on sample drives to showcase one of the West's most iconic activities. While a real "drive" might begin at 3 or 3:30 AM in deference to the extreme summer heat, we began at the more leisurely hour of 9, first learning the basic principles of riding and what to expect from our horses and the cows we'd find. Our crew of six, plus Mike, included two experienced riders and four "newbies," all of whom were eager to learn the ropes.
%Gallery-129848%Like most western-style riding, the horses were highly-trained and responded to neck reining cues – leaving a cowboy's other hand free to move as necessary. We learned the basic principals of moving cattle – driving them from behind. Cows are pack animals and see both the horses and dogs as dominant, so they take a prey stance and move away from pressure from behind. The goal? To get our cows to "string out" and be "pulled" of their own momentum – when riding from behind in a fan or U-shape, we would (in theory) be able to get the herd to follow a pack mentality, simply exerting pressure on one side or another by turning our horses to form a barrier.
Movies often show cowboys galloping hell-bent for leather across open fields, cattle strung behind and in front of them, racing as if their lives depended on it. In reality, Mike explained, a cattle drive is a slow, leisurely process, most often experienced at a walk or "long trot." The idea is to move the cattle at their natural pace so as not to "take pounds off," as steers and beef cattle were priced by weight. Running the cattle would result in thinner, less profitable sales.
Drives could take place for a variety of reasons – to move cows to market, rounding them to separate a neighbor's cows from your own, branding or vetting, or moving cattle from one pasture to another. Cattle typically graze across many acres of land, and while these animals often stick to groups, they don't remain in tight pack. Ranches may range from a few thousand to tens of thousands of acres, with a variety of terrain surroundings, including brush, trees, and large hills.
Most cowboys employ highly-trained dogs to assist in herding. These nimble, agile creatures are voice-command trained and can dodge in and out of herds with ease, nipping flanks and ankles as necessary to get the cattle to move at a certain speed or in a certain direction.
Mike's dog, Sis, was the eighth in a long line, he explained. We quickly learned that we were superfluous – Mike, his horse, and Sis could easily have handled the 35 or so head of cattle we were tasked with rounding, driving to a pen a few miles away, sorting, and putting the cattle back in their home pasture.
The eight-year-old dog was the star of the show, responding to commands that showed a human-like level of understanding to "get one," "get two" or "get 'em all," to "slow," "round up," or "go sit on that rock." If Sis had opposable thumbs, I don't doubt she could have done my job as a writer. (We learned later that Mike and Sis could have handled this job with three times as many cattle by themselves… we were merely observers.)
The horses aided in the drive as well, often getting right up behind recalcitrant steers and "encouraging" movement with a little nip on the rear.
When we eventually got the cattle to a pen (two hour later) we learned the art of cutting in and sorting out specific steer or heifer, using the same basic principals employed while driving en masse.
Four hours later, we dismounted, sweaty and saddle sore, but victorious. We'd moved cattle. Like any true cowboy, Mike tipped his hat and shook hands before walking off to care for his horses, leaving us with a newfound respect for the adventures of the (semi-wild) West.
And of course, for your viewing pleasure – don't miss one of our favorite cowboy songs below:
This writer's visit was sponsored by The Resort at Paws Up, but her opinions are solely her own.


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Create a Website Account - Manage notification subscriptions, save form progress and more.
On the corner of Burney and N. Fifth streets, the future Canaan Corner Store will replace this 1980s block building that has been designated slum and blight. Redevelopment plans offer to this walking neighborhood an accessible corner pantry, without alcoholic beverages and video gambling per neighborhood request.
Related History
Related Projects
City's Proactive Purchase
Neighbhorhood Needs
To lease space or for more information, contact
706-342-1251 x1207.


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You probably noticed the trend of making custom designed plugin/theme options UIs, especially in the commercial ones (on CodeCanyon for example - custom boxes, tabs, accordions etc).
I personally believe that UI should be unified in the first place and that is really easy in WP to achieve using some core's default HTML structure + CSS classes => following the styling guide.
However it is maybe sometimes not enough and that's why why there is that trend. Another reason could be "branding" or just some "coolness effect".
What do you think about this? Do you prefer some custom designed UIs or the default one and why?
P.S. The main reason I ask this is also because these days I started with plugin development and I trying to make this decision of which path to choose.


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Wineries on Twitter Scott Paul Wines
On the Web: www.scottpaul.com On Twitter @scottpaulpn On Facebook
The goal of this series is to connect with wineries and wine business that use Social Media (Twitter and Facebook) effectively. These interviews can serve as a catalyst to help other wineries and wine businesses to see the benefits (and pitfalls) of joining the social revolution.
Interview Questions
How long have you been using Twitter?
Since late 2008
What prompted you to dive in?
The inter-connectedness of people with shared interests really appealed to me, and I found much of the information in the Twitterverse quite interesting…
What type of strategy or approach do you use when posting content?
A little bit of everything – links to my blog posts, announcements of new releases & events, photos of current activities in the vineyards and winery, chatter about my beloved Arsenal soccer team in London, updates from my weeks in Burgundy, Twitter-only specials in the tasting room, etc.
What have been the benefits of using Twitter/Facebook? (increased traffic, increased brand awareness, customer connection, etc)
We've definitely seen evidence of all of the above – especially increased web traffic, great customer connections. When our stuff gets retweeted we often see significant spikes in our web activity…
What do you think is the single biggest barrier to why we don't see more wineries actively using Social Media tools? People probably think it takes too much time – but it really doesn't.
What advice would you give to wineries joining the stream or getting back into the stream?
Embrace it enthusiastically, have something to say besides "buy my wine", and enter into conversations – social media is not broadcasting, it is social interaction…
Briefly tell us about your winery, a new release, or something unique about you?
We're the only winery that I'm aware of that is also a major national importer – we import 15 of the top producers in Burgundy and a killer grower Champagne – all the imports as well as our own wines are available here in our tasting room – a unique opportunity to taste old-world and new-world Pinot side-by-side. Most people don't know that I was America's most-listened-to radio personality in the 80s – I was Shadow Stevens on Z-100 New York, Pirate Radio Los Angeles, and had a nationally syndicated show called Hitline USA that aired in 350+ markets. And I once lived on the tour bus with the band Poison. But that's another story for another time…
What is your favorite rock band and why?
Pearl Jam – I was an executive at Epic Records when we signed them and launched their first album – it was exciting to be a part of all of that…
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This article is more than 1 year old
Ten technology FAILS
Tech that might have revolutionised your life but you have now completely forgotten
Video CD
Without the Video CD, would there have been the DVD? Probably, but Video CD was the first attempt to deliver sell-through video on an 12cm laser-scanned optical disc. Devised in 1993 by Sony, Philips, Matsushita and JVC as a way of cramming video content onto CDs, which had originally been devised solely for audio information. And credit where it's due, they got it to work. Just not very well. The MPEG encoding system available was only able to deliver VHS-quality pictures and they were often packed with motion and compression artefacts. With only 800-odd megabytes of storage capacity per disc, longer movies needed to be split over multiple discs. But even had Video CD been able to hold more, DVD's arrival at the end of the decade after a mid-decade debut with almost-broadcast quality standard definition imagery did for it. With DVD coming, few content companies were keen to support Video CD and, for the same image quality, you could get VHS recordings, which were cheaper. Since then, Video CD has become popular in Asia, but in the West it never amounted to much.
Philips' CD-i, a Video CD rebrand (and a fail too)
Back in the late 1990s, the world became obsessed with the web and how it might change shopping, media consumption and even how we interact with computers. Over-eager investors led to the first dotcom crash, but while e-commerce survived and later thrived, as did digital media, another web 'revolution' disappeared, almost without a trace. I'm talking about the 'webtop', the notion that Windows, Mac OS, Solaris, Linux and all the other desktop operating systems would be replaced by front-ends to live web-based services, apps and file-stores. Businesses could jump on the web bandwagon and could economise by buying cheaper, OS-less computers for their employees. But while some web apps, such as Salesforce, would go on to make waves, web-based desktops never did.
Webtop de nos jours: Google's Chrome OS
Yet the notion never quite died. Even now, Google hopes its Chrome OS webtop will win over punters who can be certain they're going to be online all the time and are happy to use apps and services delivered by a single vendor. May be they will, but at the time of the webtops, they certainly weren't. ®


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Devon, PA. Most people, agrarian or otherwise, do not read poetry anymore. Ours is not merely a forgetful culture, but one that has long since ceased to approve of memory as something more than a faculty. It used to be an art, however; and if a culture fails to appreciate or see practical necessity in the art of indelibly inscribing great rhetoric in the mind, or rather, in rhetoric whose greatness makes it memorable, that culture likely will not find much merit in poems either.
Poetic meter and rhyme had their origin as mnemonic devices, aiding the retention of vast strands of story, reflection, satire, and praise. As is true of any enduring reality, these things developed and grew more sophisticated over centuries, so that the mnemonic function became also a means to improvisation; if one of Homer's heirs forgot a line, the metrical pattern helped him carry on speaking—"across the wine-dark sea"—until he found the thread.
In the age of manuscript culture and, much more so, print culture, these mnemonic and oral conveniences lost much of their importance, and the intricate stanzas most of us can identify as "poetry" on sight developed. Even so, without a love and use for the art of memory, one probably cannot long care for poetry. Too much of its interest is entangled with hearing it as something spoken and yet permanent; the only way human beings can possess such an eternal word is to chisel it onto the firmest stone of their memories. The Victorians, instructively, had a great taste for redundant ballads, because the refrains aided memorization and made recitation exciting even when the matter was trite.
The preceding comments I offer as a sort of apology. For, if few men think much on poetry, then even fewer preoccupy themselves with a particular poetic mystery. I have long been wondering how not just poems, but religious poems, get written. The great Christian poems of the Seventeenth-Century metaphysical poets, above all, seem sometimes almost inexplicable. As most people at least will remember from high school, these poets conceived their verses according to the extended trope, the conceit. John Donne's "Batter My Heart," for instance, creates a sonnet-length figurative comparison between the experience of sinfulness and conversion, and that of a town usurped by its enemy and under siege by its savior. One readily grasps the formal mechanics of such a poem, but not the foundation that makes it so striking. The poem seems to express some truth about the nature of Christian belief, about the reluctant and inconstant worship that constitutes the religion of a Personal God.
But much modern religious verse fails to be so expressive. Briefly, much of it stumbles into a crude piety that seems to speak from the heart—if it does indeed speak from there—of the pious soul some of us might like to have but seldom do. Contemporary religious poetry—such as that of Marjorie Maddox, whose work I reviewed in a recent Pleiades—takes a stab at filtering the old metaphysical conceit through modern surrealist juxtapositions, in hopes of startling us into a real encounter with the divine. Some of Maddox's poems envision God dressed up as a clown on Halloween, or describe the Incarnation of Christ in terms of spirit pulling on a rubber surgical glove. I find something clever there, but nothing comparable to the method or intention of the metaphysicals.
If modern poetry cannot convincingly capture or express what it means to believe in God, one wonders if our age is any longer capable of such belief. Has religious belief been so emptied of experiential content that its inexpressibility as poem inversely suggests its life-in-death as a kind of system that counters experience, an imposition of the will against the memory and understanding,—as an ideology?
A possible place to begin contemplating such questions is George Herbert's (1593-1633) little shrub of a verse, "Love-joy." A brief didactic anecdote entirely unimpressive at first glance, it reads thus:
As on a window late I cast mine eye,
I saw a vine drop grapes with J and C
Anneal'd on every bunch. One standing by
Ask'd what it meant. I (who am never loth
To spend my judgement) said, It seem'd to me
To be the body and the letters both
Of Joy and Charity. Sir, you have not miss'd,
The man reply'd. It figures JESUS CHRIST.
The poet, who spent the last years of his life as a parson at St. Andrews Church in Bemerton, relates this exchange. He sees before his eyes two letters printed on a bunch of grapes; the "As" sounds for a moment as if a simile is about to occur, but we quickly realize he means simply, "As I was looking at a stained glass window, I noticed these lettered grapes." Some fellow nearby asks him to explain what those letters stand for, and the prim parson who loves to share his opinions explains that the letters stand for "Joy" and "Charity." The interlocutor says, "Yes, you're right"—even though literally the parson errs. But, figuratively, the parson speaks the truth, for Joy and Charity are attributes of Jesus Christ.
So many of the familiar metaphysical poems—Herbert's "The Collar," and "The Pulley," or Donne's "Valediction" and "Flea"—seek, it seems, to startle us with the unanticipated and counter-intuitive tropes on which they are built. This one gives us an account of how organic or natural the conception of such tropes actually can be: the counter-intuitive trope reveals an intuitive quotidian reality. Herbert lived in a Christian landscape. Passing along the side of St. Andrews, perhaps on his way to pay a visit or head home for dinner, he would see the diverse "annealing" acts that human beings had gone about to inscribe the surface of their lives with reminders of its Creator.
His poems of devotion arose naturally from a life saturated by, and in contemplation of, the adjuncts and equipment of mundane Christian habit. What he normally sees reveals what he cannot see; what appears to be a mistake, or failure to see the truth, opens onto the True itself; and the written letters of the things of this world speak almost incidentally of the Divine Body. But one must live with a certain literal constancy, cultivating and contemplating a steady place, if one hopes to see through its surfaces to the heights and depths they can only intimate.
This poem might have been written otherwise, concealing the quotidian origin of grapes annealed with J and C, and leaving only the trope. But here, in a particularly candid tableau, Herbert suggests to us that to speak of the divine—in poetry or anywhere—requires spending one's life among often unremarkable reminders, the minor features of human life that only occasionally stir the mind to recall the source of itself.
The tendency to secularize the places in which we dwell finds its violent origins in the iconoclasm of early Protestant sects, and Herbert was not without his iconoclastic side. We live in a world largely wiped clean by that secularizing impulse—so much so that the impulse itself has become secular. This has wrought for us a world that seems determined to the profane—in the ecclesiastic sense of that word. The devotion one finds in this Herbert poem thus suggests that the interest and achievement of the religious verse of his age results not precisely from a more sophisticated and sincere piety, but from a people who recognized piety and reflection as a good and so worked to shape the material world—in "body and the letters both"—that it might lead them to meditate on the divine one. Paradoxically, two letters here embody the incarnate God, and so preach his "letter," the good news (joy) of charity. In the process of this shaping, the material reveals itself as a gift of the divine and as a mute expression of its truth.